really gay twilight
by Gaybeauswan
Summary: if you like gay Beau this is for you I'm going to be also putting midnight sun with this but since it's only up to chapter 12 I'll be on my own. this will be fixing the problems with the series with a new plot for breaking dawn


**Beau pov****Unable are the loved to die, for love is immortality****\--Emily Dickinson****Preface****I'd never given much thought to how I would die — though I'd had reason enough in the last few months — but even if I had, I would not have imagined it like this.****I stared without breathing across the long room, into the dark eyes of the hunter, and he looked pleasantly back at me.****Surely it was a good way to die, in the place of someone else, someone I loved. Noble, even. That ought to count for something.****I knew that if I'd never gone to Forks, I wouldn't be facing death now. But, terrified as I was, I couldn't bring myself to regret the decision. When life offers you a dream so far beyond any of your expectations, it's not reasonable to grieve when it comes to an end.****The hunter smiled in a friendly way as he sauntered forward to kill me.****1\. First Sight****My mother drove me to the airport with the windows rolled down. Though it was January everywhere else, it was seventy-five degrees in Phoenix and the sky was a perfect, cloudless blue. I was wearing my favorite tank top; I was wearing it as a farewell gesture. I wouldn't be needing tank tops anymore.****In the Olympic Peninsula of northwest Washington State, a small town named Forks exists under a near-constant cover of clouds. It rains on this insignificant town more than any other place in the United States of America. It was from this town and its depressing gloom that my mom escaped with me when I was only a few months old. It was in this town that I'd been forced to spend a month every summer until I was fourteen. That was the year I finally put my foot down; these past three summers, my dad, Charlie, vacationed with me in California for two weeks instead.****Yet, somehow, I now found myself exiled back to Forks for the rest of my high school education. A year and a half. Eighteen months. Of course, this was my choice. It was a self-imposed exile, but that didn't make it any easier.****I loved Phoenix. I loved the sun and the blistering heat. I loved the vigorous, sprawling city.****"Beau," my mom said to me—the last of a thousand times—before I boarded the plane. "You don't have to do this."****My mother and I look so much alike; the same shaped face, the same nose, the same pale gray eyes. No one would doubt we're mother and son. I felt an empty feeling in the pit of my stomach as I stared at her wide, childlike eyes that were so like mine. How could I leave my loving, erratic, harebrained mother to fend for herself? Was leaving my mom the right thing to do? It seemed like it was, during the months I'd struggled toward this decision. But now, in this moment, it felt all kinds of wrong.****Of course she had Phil now, so the bills would probably get paid, there would be food in the refrigerator, gas in her car, and someone to call when she got lost, but still…****"Iwantto go," I lied. I'd always been a bad liar, but I'd been saying this lie so frequently lately that it sounded almost convincing now.****"Tell Charlie I said hi."****"I will."****"I'll see you soon," she insisted. "You can come home whenever you want—I'll come right back as soon as you need me."****But I could see the sacrifice in her eyes behind the promise.****"Don't worry about me," I urged. "It'll be great. I love you, Mom."****She hugged me tightly for a minute, and then I walked through the gate, got on the plane, and she was gone.****It's a three-hour flight from Phoenix to Seattle, another hour in a smaller plane up to Port Angeles, and then an hour drive back down to Forks. Flying doesn't bother me; the hour in the car with Charlie, though, I was a little worried about.****Charlie had really been pretty decent about the whole thing. He seemed genuinely pleased that I was coming to live with him for the first time with any degree of permanence. He'd already gotten me registered for high school and was going to help me get a car.****But it would be awkward. Neither of us was what anyone would call outgoing, and I didn't know what there was to say regardless. I knew he was more than a little confused by my decision— like my mother before me, I hadn't made a secret of my disdain for Forks.****When I landed in Port Angeles, it was raining. I didn't see it as an omen, just an inevitability. I'd already said my goodbyes to the sun.****Charlie was waiting for me with the cruiser. This I was also expecting. Charlie is Police Chief Swan to the good people of Forks. My primary motivation behind buying a car, despite the scarcity of funds, was that I refused to be driven around town in a car with red and blue lights on the top. Nothing slows down traffic like a cop.****I stumbled off the plane into Charlie's awkward, one-armed hug.****"It's good to see you, Beau," he said, smiling as he automatically caught and steadied me. "You haven't changed much. How's Renée?****"Mom's great. It's good to see you, too, Dad." I wasn't supposed to call him Charlie to his face.****I only had a few bags. Most of my Arizona clothes were too permeable for Washington. My mom and I had pooled our resources to supplement my winter wardrobe, but it was still scanty. It all fit easily into the trunk of the cruiser.****"I found a good car for you, really cheap." he announced when we were strapped into the cruiser and on our way.****"What kind of car?" I asked, suspicious of the way he said "good carfor you" as opposed to just "good car."****"Well, it's a truck actually, a Chevy."****"Where did you find it?"****"Do you remember Billy Black down at La Push?" La Push is the small Native American reservation on the nearby coastline.****"Not really, sorry."****"He used to go fishing with us during the summer," Charlie prompted.****That would explain why I didn't remember him. I do a good job of blocking painful things from my memory.****"He's in a wheelchair now," Charlie continued when I didn't respond, "so he can't drive anymore, and he offered to sell me the truck cheap."****"What year is it?" I could see from the change in his expression that this was the question he was hoping I wouldn't ask.****"Well, Billy's son has done a lot of work on the engine— it's only a few years old, really."****Did he really think I would give up that easily?****"When did he buy it?"****"He bought it in 1984, I think."****"Did he buy it new?"****"Well, no. I think it was new in the early sixties— or late fifties at the earliest," He admitted sheepishly.****"Ch— Dad, I don't really know anything about cars. I wouldn't be able to fix it if anything went wrong, and I couldn't afford a mechanic..."****"Really, Beau, the thing runs great. They don't build them like that anymore."****The thing,I thought to myself…it had possibilities—as a nickname, at the very least.****"How cheap is cheap?" After all, that was the part I couldn't compromise on.****"Well, son, I kind of already bought it for you. As a homecoming gift." Charlie glanced sideways at me with a hopeful expression.****Wow. Free.****"You didn't need to do that, Dad. I was going to buy myself a car."****"I don't mind. I want you to be happy here." He was looking ahead at the road when he said this. Charlie had never been comfortable with expressing his emotions out loud. I inherited that from him. So I was looking straight ahead as I responded.****"That's amazing, Dad. Thanks. I really appreciate it." No need to add that my being happy in Forks is an impossibility. He didn't need to suffer along with me. And I never looked a free truck in the mouth—or engine.****"Well, now, you're welcome," he mumbled, embarrassed by my thanks.****We exchanged a few more comments on the weather, which was wet, and that was pretty much it for conversation. We stared out the windows.****It was beautiful, of course; I couldn't deny that. Everything was green: the trees, their trunks covered with moss, their branches hanging with a canopy of it, the ground covered with ferns. Even the air filtered down greenly through the leaves.****It was too green—an alien planet.****Eventually, we made it to Charlie's. He still lived in the small, two bedroom house that he'd bought with my mother in the early days of their marriage. Those were the only kind of days their marriage had—the early ones. There, parked on the street in front of the house that never changed, was my new—well, new to me—truck. It was a faded red color, with big, rounded fenders and a bulbous cab.****And, to my surprise, I loved it. I had always seen myself in something small and sporty. I didn't know if it would run, but I could see myself in it. Plus, it was one of those solid iron affairs that never gets damaged—the kind you see at the scene of an accident, paint unscratched, surrounded by the pieces of the foreign car it had destroyed.****"Wow, Dad, I love it! Thanks!" I was genuinely enthused about the truck. Not only was it perfect, now I wouldn't be faced with the choice of either walking two miles in the rain to school or accepting a ride in the Chief's cruiser.****"I'm glad you like it," Charlie said gruffly, embarrassed again.****It took only one trip to get all my stuff upstairs. I got the west bedroom that faced out over the front yard. The room was familiar; it had belonged to me since I was born. The wooden floor, the light blue walls, the peaked ceiling, the blue checkered curtains around the window—these were all a part of my childhood. The only changes Charlie had ever made were switching the crib for a bed and adding a desk as I grew. The desk now held a secondhand computer, with the phone line for the modem stapled along the floor to the nearest phone jack. This was a stipulation from my mother, so that we could stay in touch easily. The rocking chair from my baby days was still in the corner.****There was only one small bathroom at the top of the stairs, which I would have to share with Charlie, but I'd had to share with my mom before, and she had a lot more stuff. This would be fine.****One of the best things about Charlie is he doesn't hover. He left me alone to unpack and get settled, a feat that would have been altogether impossible for my mother. It was nice to be alone, not to have to smile and look pleased; a relief to stare dejectedly out the window at the sheeting rain and let just a few tears escape. I wasn't in the mood to go on a real crying jag. I would save that for bedtime, when I would have to come to terms with how quickly everything had just changed, and when I would have to think about the coming morning.****Forks High School had just three hundred and fifty-seven—now fifty eight—students; there were more than seven hundred people in my junior class alone back home. All of the kids there had grown up together—their grandparents had been toddlers together. I would be the new boy from the big city, something to stare at and whisper about.****Maybe, if I had been one of the cool kids—had a little more confidence in myself—I could work this to my advantage. But I certainly wasn'tthatguy. I was always different from the other guys in my school. I wasn't the football star, not the class president, not the bad boy on the motorcycle. I was the kid who got shoved into lockers until his sophomore year. The kid who was too quiet, and too pale.****Despite the constant sunshine of Phoenix, I was still ivory-skinned and I had always been on the leaner side, obviously not an athlete; I didn't have the necessary hand-eye coordination to play sports without humiliating myself—and harming both myself and anyone else who stood too close.****When I finished putting my clothes in the old pine dresser, I took my bag of bathroom necessities and went to clean myself up after the day of travel. I looked at my face in the bathroom mirror as I ran my hands through my damp, dark hair. Maybe it was the light, but already I looked paler, if that was possible.****Facing my glum reflection in the mirror, I was forced to admit that I was lying to myself. It wasn't just physically that I'd never fit in. And if I couldn't find a niche in a school with three thousand people, what were my chances here?****I didn't relate well to people my age. Maybe the truth was that I didn't relate well to people, period. Even my mother, who I was closer to than anyone else on the planet, was never in harmony with me, never on exactly the same page. Sometimes I wondered if I was seeing the same things through my eyes that the rest of the world was seeing through theirs. Maybe there was a glitch in my brain.****But the cause didn't matter. All that mattered was the effect. And tomorrow would be just the beginning.****I didn't sleep well that night, even after I had managed to calm myself down. The constantwhooshing of the rain and the wind across the roof wouldn't fade in the background. I pulled the faded old quilt over my head, and later added the pillow, too. But I couldn't fall asleep until after midnight, when the rain finally settled into a quieter drizzle.****Thick fog was all I could see out my window in the morning, and I could feel the claustrophobia creeping up on me. You could never see the sky here; it was like a cage.****Breakfast with Charlie was a quiet event. He wished me good luck at school. I thanked him, knowing his hope was wasted. Good luck tended to avoid me. Charlie left first, off to the police station that was his wife and family. After he left, I sat at the old square oak table in one of the three un-matching chairs and examined the small kitchen, with its dark paneled walls, bright yellow cabinets, and white linoleum floor. Nothing was changed. My mother had painted the cabinets eighteen years ago in an attempt to bring some sunshine into the house. Over the small fireplace in the adjoining modestly sized family room was a row of pictures. First a wedding picture of Charlie and my mom in Las Vegas, then one of the three of us in the hospital after I was born, taken by a helpful nurse, followed by the procession of my school pictures up to last year's. Those were embarrassing to look at—maybe I could get Charlie to put them somewhere else, at least while I was living here.****It was impossible, being in this house, not to realize that Charlie had never gotten over my mom. It made me uncomfortable and a little sad.****I didn't want to be too early to school, but I couldn't stay in the house anymore. I donned my jacket—thick, non-breathing plastic, like a biohazard suit—and headed out into the rain.****It was just drizzling still, not enough to soak me through immediately as I reached for the house key that was always hidden under the eaves by the door, and locked up. The sloshing of my new waterproof boots was unnerving. I missed the normal crunch of gravel as I walked. I couldn't pause and admire my truck again as I wanted; I was in a hurry to get out of the misty wet that swirled around in the air.****Inside the truck, it was nice and dry. Either Billy or Charlie had obviously cleaned it up, but the tan upholstered seats still smelled faintly of tobacco, gasoline, and peppermint. The engine started quickly, to my relief, but loudly, roaring to life and then idling at top volume. Well, a truck this old was bound to have a flaw. The antique radio worked, a bonus that I hadn't expected.****Finding the school wasn't difficult; like most other things, it was just off the highway. It wasn't totally obvious that it was a school; only the sign, which declared it to be Forks High School, clued me in. It looked like a collection of matching houses, built with maroon-colored bricks. There were so many trees and shrubs I couldn't see its size at first. Where was the feel of the institution? I wondered sarcastically. Where were the chain-link fences, the metal detectors?****I parked in front of the first building, which had a small sign over the door reading FRONT OFFICE. N0 one else was parked there, so I was sure it was off limits, but I decided I would get directions inside instead of circling around in the rain like an idiot. I stepped unwillingly out of the toasty truck cab and walked down a little stone path lined with dark hedges. I took a deep breath before opening the door.****Inside, it was brightly lit, and warmer than I'd hoped. The office was small; a little waiting area with padded folding chairs, orange-flecked commercial carpet, notices and awards cluttering the walls, a big clock ticking loudly. Plants grew everywhere in large plastic pots, as if there wasn't enough greenery outside. The room was cut in half by a long counter, cluttered with wire baskets full of papers and brightly colored flyers taped to its front. There were three desks behind the counter, one of which was manned by a large, red-haired woman wearing glasses. She was wearing a purple t-shirt, which immediately made me feel overdressed.****The red-haired woman looked up.****"Can I help you?"****"I'm Beau Swan," I informed her, and saw the immediate awareness light her eyes. I was expected, a topic of gossip no doubt. Son of the Chief's flighty ex-wife, come home at last.****"Of course," she said. She dug through a precariously stacked pile of papers on her desk till she found the ones she was looking for. "I have your schedule right here, Beauregard, and a map of the school." She brought several sheets to the counter to show me.****"Um, it's Beau, please."****"Oh, sure, Beau."****She went through my classes for me, highlighting the best route to each on the map, and gave me a slip to have each teacher sign, which I was to bring back at the end of the day. She smiled at me and hoped, like Charlie, that I would like it here in Forks. I smiled back as convincingly as I could.****When I went back out to my truck, other students were starting to arrive. I drove around the school, following the line of traffic. I was glad to see that most of the cars were older like mine, nothing flashy. At home I'd lived in one of the few lower-income neighborhoods that were included in the Paradise Valley District. It was a common thing to see a new Mercedes or Porsche in the student lot. The nicest car here was a shiny Volvo, and it stood out. Still, I cut the engine as soon as I was in a spot, so that the thunderous volume wouldn't draw attention to me.****I looked at the map in the truck, trying to memorize it now; hopefully I wouldn't have to walk around with it stuck in front of my nose all day. I stuffed everything in my bag, slung the strap over my shoulder, and sucked in a huge breath.It won't be that bad, I lied to myself feebly. This wasn't life or death—just high school. It's not like anyone was going to bite me.****I finally exhaled and stepped out of the truck.I kept my face pulled back into my hood as I walked to the sidewalk, crowded with other students. My plain black jacket didn't stand out, I noticed with relief.****Once I got around the cafeteria, building three was easy to spot. A large black "3" was painted on a white square on the east corner. I felt a knot begin to form in my stomach as I approached the door. I took a deep breath as I followed two unisex raincoats through the door.****The classroom was small. The people in front of me stopped just inside the door to hang up their coats on a long row of hooks. I copied them. They were two girls, one a porcelain-colored blonde, the other also pale, with light brown hair. At least my skin wouldn't be a standout here.****I took the slip up to the teacher, a tall, balding man whose desk had a nameplate identifying him as Mr. Mason. He gawked at me when he saw my name—not an encouraging response—and of course I flushed tomato red. But at least he sent me to an empty desk at the back without introducing me to the class. It was harder for my new classmates to stare at me in the back, but somehow, they managed.****I kept my eyes down on the reading list the teacher had given me. It was fairly basic: Brontë, Shakespeare, Chaucer, Faulkner. I'd already read everything. That was comforting… and boring. I wondered if my mom would send me my folder of old essays, or if she would think that was cheating. I went through different arguments with her in my head while the teacher droned on.****When the bell rang, a nasal buzzing sound, a pale, skinny girl with skin problems and hair black as an oil slick leaned across the aisle to talk to me.****"You're Beauregard Swan, aren't you?" She gave off the vibe of the overly helpful, chess club type.****"Beau," I corrected. Everyone within a three-seat radius turned to look at me.****"Where's your next class?" she asked.****I had to check in my bag. "Um, Government, with Jefferson, in building six."****There was nowhere to look without meeting curious eyes.****"I'm headed toward building four, I could show you the way.…" Definitely over-helpful. "I'm Erica," she added.****I managed a smile. "Thanks."****We got our jackets and headed out into the rain, which had picked up. I could have sworn several people behind us were walking close enough to eavesdrop. I hoped I wasn't getting paranoid.****"So, this is a lot different than Phoenix, huh?" she asked.****"Very."****"It doesn't rain much there, does it?"****"Three or four times a year."****"Wow, what must that be like?" she wondered.****"Sunny," I told her.****"You don't look very tan."****"My mother is part albino."****She studied my face apprehensively, and I sighed. It looked like clouds and a sense of humor didn't mix. A few months of this and I'd forget how to use sarcasm.****We walked back around the cafeteria, to the south buildings by the gym. Erica followed me right to the door, though it was clearly marked.****"Well, good luck," she said as I touched the handle. "Maybe we'll have some other classes together." She sounded hopeful.****I smiled at her vaguely and went inside.****The rest of the morning passed in about the same fashion. My Trigonometry teacher, Mr. Varner, who I would have disliked anyway just because of the subject he taught, was the only one who made me stand in front of the class and introduce myself. I stammered, blushed, and tripped over my own boots on the way to my seat.****After two classes, I started to recognize several of the faces in each room. There was always someone braver than the others who would introduce themselves and ask me questions about how I was liking Forks. I tried to be diplomatic, but mostly I just lied a lot. At least I never needed the map.****In every class, the teacher started out calling me Beauregard, and though I corrected them immediately, it was frustrating. It had taken me years to live down Beauregard—my mom thought it sounded regal. I comforted myself with the knowledge that she chose Beauregard over Beaufort, her second choice. No one at home even remembered that Beau was just a nickname anymore. Now I had to start all over again.****One girl sat next to me in both Trig and Spanish, and she walked with me to the cafeteria for lunch. She was short, several inches shorter than my five feet seven inches, with long, straight, light-brown hair. Her bubbling, energetic personality almost seemed to make up the difference between our heights. I couldn't remember her name, so I smiled and nodded as she rattled about teachers and classes. I didn't try to keep up.****We sat at the end of a full table with several of her friends, who she introduced to me—couldn't complain about the manners here. Overwhelmed by the rush of new information, I forgot all their names as soon as she said them. They seemed impressed by her bravery in speaking to me. The girl from English, Erica, waved at me from across the room.****It was there, sitting in the lunchroom, trying to make conversation with seven curious strangers, that I first saw them.****They were sitting in the corner of the cafeteria, as far away from where I sat as possible in the long room. There were five of them. They weren't talking, and they weren't eating, though they each had a tray of untouched food in front of them. They weren't gawking at me, unlike most of the other students, so it was safe to stare at them without fear of meeting an excessively interested pair of eyes. But it was none of these things that caught, and held, my attention.****They didn't look anything alike.****There were four boys; one was big— muscled like a serious weight lifter, at least six-five or taller, with dark, curly hair. The one sitting next to him was only slightly shorter, but still well-muscled—clearly the school's star-athlete. And the prom king. His long gold hair was wound into a bun on the back of his head. The third one was almost as tall as the first, leaner, but still muscular, with honey colored hair. There was something intense about him, edgy. The last was lanky, less bulky, with untidy, bronze-colored hair. He was more boyish than the others, who looked like they could be in college, or even teachers here rather than students.****The lone girl was the complete opposite. She was short and pixie-like, thin in the extreme, with small features. Her hair was a deep black, cropped short and styled like she had fallen right out of the twenties.****Totally different, and yet, they were all exactly alike. Every one of them was chalky pale, the palest of all the students living in this sunless town. Paler than me, the albino. They all had very dark eyes—from here they looked black—despite the range in hair tones. There were deep shadows under those eyes— purplish, like bruises. As if they were all suffering from a sleepless night, or almost done recovering from a broken nose. Though their noses, all their features, were straight, perfect, angular.****But all this is not why I couldn't look away.****I stared because their faces, so different, so similar, were all devastatingly, inhumanly beautiful. They were faces you never expected to see except perhaps on the airbrushed pages of a fashion magazine. Or painted by an old master as the face of an angel. It was hard to decide who was the most beautiful— maybe the blond prom king, or the bronze-haired boy. I mean, all of them were gorgeous, but the boy with the bronze hair was something more than just beautiful. He was absolutely perfect. It was an upsetting, disturbing kind of perfection. It made my stomach uneasy.****They were all looking away; away from each other, away from the other students, away from anything in particular as far as I could tell. It reminded me of models posed artistically for an add—aesthetic ennui.****As I watched, the pixie girl rose with her tray— unopened soda, unbitten apple— and walked away with a quick, graceful lope that belonged on a runway. I watched, amazed at her lithe dancer's step, till she dumped her tray and glided through the back door, faster than I would have thought possible. My eyes darted back to the boys, who sat unchanging.****"Who arethey?" I asked the girl from my Spanish class, whose name I'd couldn't remember.****As she looked up to see who I meant— though already knowing, probably, from my tone— suddenly he looked at her, the thinner one, the boyish one, the youngest, perhaps. He looked at my neighbor for just a fraction of a second, and then his dark eyes flickered to mine.****He looked away quickly, more quickly than I could, though in a flush of embarrassment I dropped my eyes at once. In that brief flash of a glance, his face wasn't interested at all— it was as if she had called his name, and he'd looked up in an involuntary response, already having decided not to answer.****My neighbor giggled in embarrassment, looking at the table like I did.****"That's Edward and Emmett Cullen, and Royal and Jasper Hale. The one who left was Alice Cullen; they all live together with Dr. Cullen and his wife." She said this under her breath.****I glanced sideways at the beautiful boy, who was looking at his tray now, picking a bagel to pieces with long, pale fingers. His mouth was moving very quickly, his perfect lips barely opening. The other three still looked away, and yet I felt he was speaking quietly to them.****Strange, unpopular names, I thought. The kinds of names grandparents had. But maybe that was in vogue here— small-town names? I finally remembered that my neighbor was called Jessica, a perfectly common name. There were two girls named Jessica in my History class back home.****"They are… very nice-looking." I struggled with the conspicuous understatement.****"Yes!" Jessica agreed with another giggle. "They're all together though— Jasper and Alice, I mean. There's even a rumor that Emmet and Royal are like, a thing. And they live together." Her voice held all the shock and condemnation of the small town, I thought critically. But, if I was being honest, I had to admit that even in Phoenix, it would cause gossip.****"Which ones are the Cullens?" I asked. "They don't look related.…"****"Oh, they're not. Dr. Cullen is really young, in his twenties or early thirties. They're all adopted. The Hales are brothers, fraternal twins, I think— the blondes— and they're foster children."****"They look a little old for foster children."****"They are now, Jasper and Royal are both eighteen, but they've been with Mrs. Cullen since they were eight. She's their aunt or something like that."****"That's really kind of nice— for them to take care of all those kids like that, when they're so young and everything."****"I guess so," Jessica admitted reluctantly, and I got the impression that she didn't like the doctor and his wife for some reason. With the glances she was throwing at their adopted children, I would presume the reason was jealousy. "I think that Mrs. Cullen can't have any kids, though," she added, as if that lessened their kindness.****Throughout all this conversation, my eyes flickered again and again to the table where the strange family sat. They continued to look at the walls and not eat.****"Have they always lived in Forks?" I asked. Surely I would have noticed them on one of my summers here.****"No," she said in a voice that implied it should be obvious, even to a new arrival like me. "They just moved down two years ago from somewhere in Alaska."****I felt a surge of pity, and relief. Pity because, as beautiful as they were, they were outsiders, clearly not accepted. Relief that I wasn't the only newcomer here, and certainly not the most interesting by any standard. As I examined them, the youngest, one of the Cullens, looked up and met my gaze, this time with evident curiosity in his expression. As I looked swiftly away, it seemed to me that his glance held some kind of unmet expectation.****"Which one is the boy with the reddish brown hair?" I asked. I glanced at him from the corner of my eye, and he was still staring at me, but not gawking like the other students had today— he had a slightly frustrated expression. I looked down again.****"That's Edward. He's gorgeous, of course, but a complete waste of time. He doesn't date. Apparently no one here is good-looking enough for him." She sniffed, a clear case of sour grapes. I wondered when he'd turned her down.****I bit my lip to hide my smile. Then I glanced at him again. His face was turned away, but I thought his cheek appeared lifted, as if he were smiling, too.****After a few more minutes, the four of them left the table together. They all were noticeably graceful— even the big, brawny one and the golden prom king. It was unsettling to watch. The one named Edward didn't look at me again.****I sat at the table with Jessica and her friends longer than I would have if I'd been sitting alone. I was anxious not to be late for class on my first day. One of my new acquaintances, who considerately reminded me that her name was Angela, had Biology II with me the next hour. We walked to class together in silence. She was shy, too.****When we entered the classroom, Angela went to sit at a black-topped lab table exactly like the ones I was used to. She already had a neighbor. In fact, all the tables were filled but one. Next to the center aisle, I recognized Edward Cullen by his unusual hair, sitting next to that single open seat.****As I walked down the aisle to introduce myself to the teacher and get my slip signed, I was watching him surreptitiously. Just as I passed, he suddenly went rigid in his seat. He stared at me again, meeting my eyes with the strangest expression on his face— it was hostile, furious. I looked away quickly, shocked, going red again. I stumbled over a book in the walkway and had to catch myself on the edge of a table. The girl sitting there giggled.****I had been right about his eyes. They were black— coal black. Mrs. Banner signed my slip and handed me a book with no nonsense about introductions. I could tell we were going to get along. Of course, she had no choice but to send me to the one open seat in the middle of the room. I kept my eyes down as I went to sit by him, bewildered by the antagonistic stare he'd given me.****I didn't look up as I set my book on the table and took my seat, but I saw his posture change from the corner of my eye. He was leaning away from me, sitting on the extreme edge of his chair and averting his face like he smelled something bad. Inconspicuously, I tugged at my shirt at gave it a sniff. It smelled like laundry detergent. How could that be offensive? I scooted my chair to the right, giving him as much space as I could, and nervously ran my fingers through my hair.****I leaned forward, resting my head in my hand, using it to block my face from him. I angled myself away, too, for good measure. I tried to pay attention to the teacher.****Unfortunately the lecture was on cellular anatomy, something I'd already studied. I took notes carefully anyway, always looking down.****I couldn't stop myself from glancing occasionally at the strange boy next to me. During the whole class, he never relaxed his stiff position on the edge of his chair, sitting as far from me as possible. I could see his hand on his left leg was clenched into a fist, tendons standing out under his pale skin. This, too, he never relaxed. He had the long sleeves of his white shirt pushed up to his elbows, and his forearm was surprisingly hard and muscular beneath his pale skin. He wasn't nearly as slight as he'd looked next to his burly brothers.****The class seemed to drag on longer than the others. Was it because the day was finally coming to a close, or because I was waiting for his tight fist to loosen? It never did; he continued to sit so still it looked like he wasn't breathing. What was wrong with him? Was this his normal behavior? I questioned my judgment on Jessica's bitterness at lunch today. Maybe she was not as resentful as I'd thought.****It couldn't have anything to do with me. He didn't know me from Adam.****I peeked up at him one more time, and regretted it. He was glaring down at me again, his black eyes full of revulsion. As I flinched away from him, shrinking against my chair, the phraseif looks could killsuddenly ran through my mind.****At that moment, the bell rang loudly, making me jump, and Edward Cullen was out of his seat. Fluidly he rose— he was much taller than I'd thought— his back to me, and he was out the door before anyone else was out of their seat.****I sat frozen in my seat, staring blankly after him. He was so unnecessarily rude. I began gathering up my things slowly, trying to block the confusion and anger that filled me. I felt tight knots in my stomach. I hadn't done anything wrong. How could I have? I hadn't actually even met him.****"Aren't you Beauregard Swan?" a male voice asked. I looked up to see a cute, baby-faced boy, his pale blond hair carefully flat-ironed, smiling at me in a friendly way. He obviously didn't think I smelled bad.****"Beau," I corrected him, with a smile.****"I'm Mike."****"Hi, Mike."****"Do you need any help finding your next class?"****"I'm headed to the gym, actually. I think I can find it."****"That's my next class, too." He seemed thrilled, though it wasn't that big of a coincidence in a school this small.****We walked to class together; he was a chatterer— he supplied most of the conversation, which made it easy for me. He'd lived in California till he was ten, so he knew how I felt about the sun. It turned out he was in my English class also. He was the nicest person I'd met today.****But as we were entering the gym, he asked, "So, did you stab Edward Cullen with a pencil or what? I've never seen him act like that."****I cringed. So Iwasn'tthe only one who had noticed. And, apparently, that wasn't Edward Cullen's usual behavior. I decided to play dumb.****"Was that the boy I sat next to in Biology?" I asked artlessly.****"Yeah," he said. "He looked like he was in pain or something."****"I don't know," I responded. "I never spoke to him."****"He's a weird guy." Mike lingered by me instead of heading straight into the locker room. "If I were sitting by you, I would have talked to you." He started blushing, "You seem cool!" He added quickly.****I smiled at him and he quickly walked through the locker room door, I followed slightly bemused. He was friendly and possibly liked me. But it wasn't enough to ease my irritation.****The Gym teacher, Coach Clapp, found me a uniform but didn't make me dress down for today's class. At home, only two years of P.E. were required. Here, P.E. was mandatory all four years. Forks was literally my personal hell on Earth.****I watched four volleyball games running simultaneously. Remembering how many injuries I had sustained— and inflicted— playing volleyball, I felt faintly nauseated.****The final bell rang at last. I walked slowly to the office to return my paperwork. The rain had drifted away, but the wind was strong, and colder. I wrapped my arms around myself.****When I walked into the warm office, I almost turned around and walked back out.****Edward Cullen stood at the desk in front of me. I recognized again that tousled bronze hair. He didn't appear to notice the sound of my entrance. I stood pressed against the back wall, waiting for the receptionist to be free.****He was arguing with her in a low, attractive voice. I quickly picked up the gist of the argument. He was trying to trade from sixth-hour Biology to another time— any other time. I just couldn't believe that this was about me. It had to be something else, something that happened before I entered the Biology room. The look on his face must have been about another aggravation entirely. It was impossible that this stranger could take such a sudden, intense dislike to me.****The door opened again, and the cold wind suddenly gusted through the room, rustling the papers on the desk, waving through my hair. The girl who came in merely stepped to the desk, placed a note in the wire basket, and walked out again. But Edward Cullen's back stiffened, and he turned slowly to glare at me— his face was absurdly handsome— with piercing, hate-filled eyes. For an instant, I felt a thrill of genuinefear, raising the hair on my arms. The look only lasted a second, but it chilled me more than the freezing wind. He turned back to the receptionist.****"Never mind, then," he said hastily in a voice like velvet. "I can see that it's impossible. Thank you so much for your help." And he turned on his heel without another look at me, and disappeared out the door.****I went meekly to the desk, my face white for once instead of red, and handed her the signed slip.****"How did your first day go, dear?" the receptionist asked maternally.****"Fine," I lied, my voice cracking. I could see I hadn't convinced her.****When I got to the truck, it was almost the last car in the lot. It seemed like a haven, already the closest thing to home I had in this damp green hole. I sat inside for a while, just staring out the windshield blankly. But soon I was cold enough to need the heater, so I turned the key and the engine roared to life. I headed back to Charlie's house, grappling with the knots in my stomach till I was fighting tears.****Edward pov****I cannot die; who drank delight**** From the cup of the crescent moon,****And hungrily as men eat bread,**** Loved the scented nights of June****The rest may die – but there is not**** Some shining strange escape for me****Who sought in Beauty the bright wine**** Of immortality**** -Sara Teasedale****Preface****After everything, it had come to this.****Love changes you. It reshapes you. It carefully and systematically cuts every tie and bind you may have known up to thatpoint in time and carefully restrings them to something new. One heart to another.****My heart had been ice for so long and this warmth was unlike anything I had known in a century of existence. Now, I would lose it. Lose my very reason for living.****The monster was rejoicing—celebrating his victory. I didn't know if I could stop him this time. Everything he wanted lay broken on the floor in a pool of blood. He screamed with desire, with an animal need.****Everything I had done to keep him at bay had been in vain. Now, I was faced with a choice; would I allow the monster to win? Or would I destroy him?****1\. First Sight****This was the time of day when I wished I were able to sleep.****High school.****Or was purgatory the right word? If therewasany way to atone for my sins, this ought to count toward the tally in some measure. The tedium was not something I grew used to; every day seemed more impossibly monotonous than the last.****I suppose thiswasmy form of sleep—if sleep was defined as the inert state between active periods.****I stared at the cracks running through the plaster in the far corner of the cafeteria, imagining patterns into them that were not there. It was one way to tune out the voices that babbled like the gush of a river inside my head.****Several hundred of these voices I ignored out of boredom.****When it came to the human mind, I'd heard it all before and then some. Today, all thoughts were consumed with the trivial drama of a new addition to the small student body here. It took so little to work them all up. I'd seen the new face repeated in thought after thought from every angle. Just an ordinary human boy. The excitement over his arrival was tiresomely predictable—like flashing a shiny object at a child. Half the females were already imagining themselves in love with him, just because he was something new to look at. I tried harder to tune them out.****Only four voices did I block out of courtesy rather than distaste; my family, my three brothers and one sister, who were so used to the lack of privacy in my presence that they rarely gave it a thought. I gave them what privacy I could. I tried not to listen if I could help it.****Try as I may, still… I knew.****Royal was thinking, as usual, about himself. He'd caught sight of his profile in the reflection of someone's glasses, and he was mulling over his own perfection. Royal's mind was a shallow pool with few surprises.****Emmett was fuming over a wrestling match he'd lost to Jasper during the night. It would take all his limited patience to make it to the end of the school day to orchestrate a rematch. I never really felt intrusive hearing Emmett's thoughts, because he never thought one thing that he would not say aloud or put into action. Perhaps I only felt guilty reading the others' minds because I knew there were things there that they wouldn't want me to know. If Royal's mind was a shallow pool, then Emmett's was a lake with no shadows, glass clear.****And Jasper was…suffering. I suppressed a sigh.****Edward. Alice called my name in her head, and had my attention at once.****It was just the same as having my name called aloud. I was glad my given name had fallen out of style lately—it had been annoying; anytime anyone thought of any Edward, my head would turn automatically…****My head didn't turn now. Alice and I were good at these private conversations. It was rare than anyone caught us. I kept my eyes on the lines in the plaster.****How is he holding up?She asked me.****I frowned, just a small change in the set of my mouth. Nothing that would tip the others off. I could easily be frowning out of boredom.****Alice's mental tone was alarmed now, and I saw in her mind that she was watching Jasper in her peripheral vision.****Is there any danger?She searched ahead, into the immediate future, skimming through visions of monotony for the source behind my frown.****I turned my head slowly to the left, as if looking at the bricks of the wall, sighed, and then to the right, back to the cracks in the ceiling. Only Alice knew I was shaking my head.****She relaxed.Let me know if it gets too bad.****I moved only my eyes, up to the ceiling above, and back down.****Thanks for doing this.****I was glad I couldn't answer her aloud. What would I say? 'My pleasure'? It was hardly that. I didn't enjoy listening to Jasper's struggles. Was it really necessary to experiment like this? Wouldn't the safer path be to just admit that he might never be able to handle the thirst the way the rest of us could, and not push his limits? Why flirt with disaster?****It had been two weeks since our last hunting trip. That was not an immensely difficult time span for the rest of us. A little uncomfortable occasionally—if a human walked too close, if the wind blew the wrong way. But humans rarely walked too close. Their instincts told them what their conscious minds would never understand; we were dangerous.****Jasper was very dangerous right now.****At that moment, a small girl paused at the end of the closest table to ours, stopping to talk to a friend. She tossed her short, sandy hair, running her fingers through it. The heaters blew her scent in our direction. I was used to the way that scent made me feel—the dry ache in my throat, the hollow yearn in my stomach, the automatic tightening of my muscles, the excess flow of venom in my mouth…****This was quite normal, usually easy to ignore. It was harder just now, with the feelings stronger, doubled, as I monitored Jasper's reaction. Twin thirsts, rather than just mine.****Jasper was letting his imagination get away from him. He was picturing it—picturing himself getting up from his seat next to Alice and going to stand beside the little girl. Thinking of leaning down and in, as if he were going to whisper in her ear, and letting his lips touch the arch of her throat. Imagining how the hot flow of her pulse beneath the fine skin would feel under his mouth…****I kicked his chair.****He met my gaze for a minute, and then looked down. I could hear shame and rebellion war in his head.****"Sorry," Jasper muttered.****I shrugged.****"You weren't going to do anything," Alice murmured to him, soothing his chagrin. "I could see that."****I fought back the grimace that would give her lie away. We had to stick together, Alice and me. It wasn't easy, hearing voices or seeing visions of the future. Both freaks among those who were already freaks. We protected each other's secrets.****"It helps a little if you think of them as people," Alice suggested, her high, musical voice too fast for human hears to understand, if any had been close enough to hear. "Her name is Whitney. She had a baby sister she adores. Her mother invited Esme to that garden party, do you remember?"****"I know who she is," Jasper said curtly. He turned away to stare out one of the small windows that were spaced just under the eaves around the long room. His tone ended the conversation.****He would have to hunt tonight. It was ridiculous to take risks like this, trying to test his strength, to build his endurance. Jasper should just accept his limitations and work within them. His former habits were not conducive to our chosen lifestyle; he shouldn't push himself this way.****Alice sighed silently and stood, taking her tray of food—her prop, as it were—with her and leaving him alone. She knew when he'd had enough of her encouragement. Though Royal and Emmett were more flagrant about their relationship, it was Alice and Jasper who knew each other's every mood as well as their own. As if they could read minds, too—only just each other's.****Edward Cullen.****Reflex reaction. I turned to the sound of my name being called, though it wasn't being called, just thought.****My eyes locked for a small portion of a second with a pair of wide, silver-gray human eyes set in a pale, heart-shaped face. I knew the face, though I'd never seen it myself before this moment. It had been foremost in every human head today. The new student, Beauregard Swan. Son of the town's chief of police, brought to live here by some new custody situation. Beau. He'd corrected everyone who'd used his full name…****I looked away, bored. It took me a second to realize that he had not been the one to think my name.****Not surprising he's asking about the Cullens, I heard the first thought continue.****Now I recognized the 'voice.' Jessica Stanley—it had been a while since she had bothered me with her internal chatter. What a relief it had been when she'd gotten over her misplaced infatuation. It used to be nearly impossible to escape her constant, ridiculous daydreams. I'd wished, at the time, that I could explain to herexactlywhat would have happened if my lips, and the teeth behind them, had gotten anywhere near her. That would have silenced those annoying fantasies. The thought of her reaction almost made me smile.****I wonder if he's… I guess I can't just ask him,Jessica went on.He's really cute. I'm not surprised Erica's been staring at him so much. He's definitely cuter than Mike.****She winced mentally on the last name. Her new infatuation, the generically popular Mike Newton, was completely oblivious to her. However, he was not as oblivious to the new boy. Poor girl, she has no idea. Despite Jessica's preoccupation with the Newton boy, she was animatedly speaking to the newcomer, explaining to him the commonly held knowledge about my family. The new student must have asked about us.****He's so quiet! He's hardly talking to anyone other than me,Jessica was thinking,maybe Mike will want to ask me what he's li—"****I tried to block the inane chatter out of my head before the trivial mundanity could drive me mad.****"Jessica Stanley is giving the new Swan boy all the dirty laundry on the Cullen clan," I murmured to Emmett as a distraction.****He chuckled under his breath.I hope she's making it good,he thought.****"Rather unimaginative, actually. Just the barest hint of scandal. Not an ounce of horror. I'm a little disappointed."****And the new boy? Is he disappointed in the gossip as well?****I listened to hear what this new boy, Beau, thought of Jessica's story. What did he see when he looked at the strange, chalky-skinned family that was universally avoided.****It was sort of my responsibility to know his reaction. I acted as a lookout, for lack of a better word, for my family. To protect us. If anyone ever grew suspicious, I could give us an early warning and an easy retreat. It happened occasionally—some human with an active imagination would see in us the characters of a book or a movie. Usually they got it wrong, but it was better to move on somewhere new than risk scrutiny.****Very, very rarely, someone would guess right. We didn't give them a chance to test their hypothesis. We simply disappeared, to become no more than a frightening memory…****I heard nothing, though I listened close beside where Jessica's frivolous internal monologue continued to gush. It was as if there was no one sitting beside her. How peculiar, had the boy moved? That didn't seem likely, as Jessica was still babbling to him. I looked up to check, feeling off-balance. Checking on what my extra 'hearing' couldn't tell me—it wasn't something I ever had to do.****Again, my gaze locked on those same wide gray eyes. He was sitting right where he had been before, and looking at us, a natural thing to be doing, I supposed, as Jessica was still regaling him with the local gossip about the Cullens.****Thinking about us, too, would be natural.****But I couldn't hear a whisper.****Inviting warm red stained his cheeks as he looked down, away from the embarrassing gaffe of getting caught staring at a stranger. It was good that Jasper was still gazing out the window. I didn't like to imagine what that easy pooling of blood would do to his control.****The emotions had been as clear on the new boy's face as if they were spelled out in words across his forehead; surprise, as he unknowingly absorbed the signs of the subtle differences between his kind and mine, curiosity, as he listened to Jessica's tale, and something more… fascination? It wouldn't be the first time. We were beautiful to them, our intended prey. Then, finally, embarrassment as I caught him staring at me.****And yet, though his thoughts had been so clear in his odd eyes—odd, because of the warmth and softness to them; gray eyes often seemed cold and hard to me—I could hear nothing but silence from the place he was sitting. Nothing at all.****I felt a moment of unease.****This was nothing I'd ever encountered before. Was there something wrong with me? I felt exactly the same as I always did. Worried, I listened harder.****All the voices I'd been blocking were suddenly shouting in my head.****…wonder what music he likes…maybe I could mention that new CD…Mike Newton was thinking, two tables away—fixated on Beau Swan.****Look at Edward staring at him. Isn't it enough that half the students in school are waiting for him to…Erica Yorkie was thinking sulfurous thoughts, also revolving around the boy.****…So disgusting. You'd think he was famous or something… Even Edward Cullen, staring…Logan Mallory was so jealous that his face, by all rights, should be dark jade in color.And Jessica, flaunting her new best friend. What a joke…Vitriol continued to spew from the boy's thoughts.****…I bet everyone has asked him that. But I'd like to talk to him. I'll think of a more original question…Lauren Mallory, Logan's twin sister, mused.****…Maybe he'll be in my Spanish…Ashley Dowling hoped.****…tons left to do tonight! Trig, and the English test. I hope my mom… Angela Weber, a quiet girl, whose thoughts were unusually kind, was the only one at the table who wasn't obsessed with this Beau.****I could hear them all, hear every insignificant thing they were thinking as it passed through their minds. But nothing at all from the new student with the deceptively communicative eyes.****And, of course, I could hear what the boy said when he spoke to Jessica. I didn't have to read minds to be able to hear his low, clear voice on the far side of the room.****"Which one is the boy with the reddish brown hair?" I heard him ask, sneaking a look at me from the corner of his eyes, only to look quickly away when he saw that I was still staring.****If I'd had time to hope that hearing the sound of his voice would help me pinpoint the tone of his thoughts, lost somewhere I couldn't access them, I was instantly disappointed. Usually, people's thoughts came to them in a similar pitch as their physical voices. But this quiet, shy voice was unfamiliar, not one of the hundreds of thoughts bouncing around the room, I was sure of that. Entirely new.****I knew he liked boys!Jessica thought before answering the new student's question. "That's Edward. He's gorgeous, of course, but don't waste your time. He doesn't date. Apparently no one here is good-looking enough for him." She sniffed.****I turned my head away to hide my smile. Jessica and her classmates had no idea how lucky they were that none of them particularly appealed to me.****Beneath the transient humor, I felt a strange impulse, one I did not clearly understand. It had something to do with the predatory nature of the thoughts swirling around this Beau Swan—so many of the students wanted to impose their way into his life. I felt the strangest urge to step in, to shield this Beau from the selfish workings of his classmates' minds. What an odd thing to feel. Trying to ferret out the motivations behind impulse, I examined the new boy one more time.****Perhaps it was just some long buried protective instinct—the strong for the weak. This boy looked more fragile than his new classmates. His skin was so translucent it was hard to believe it offered him much defense from the outside world. I could see the rhythmic pulse of blood through his veins under the clear, pale membrane… But I should not concentrate on that. I was good at this life I'd chosen, but I was just as thirsty as Jasper and there was no point in inviting temptation.****There was a faint crease between Beau's dark eyebrows that he seemed unaware of.****It was unbelievably frustrating! I could clearly see that it was a strain for him to sit there, to make conversation with strangers, to be the center of attention. I could sense his shyness from the way he held his shoulders, slightly hunched, as if he was expecting a rebuff at any moment. And yet I could only sense, could only see, could only imagine. There was nothing but silence from the very quiet human boy. I could hear nothing. Why?****"Shall we?" Royal murmured, interrupting my focus.****I looked away from Beau Swan with a sense of relief. I didn't want to continue to fail at this—it irritated me. And I didn't want to develop any interest in his hidden thoughts simply because they were hidden from me. No doubt, when I did decipher his thoughts—and Iwouldfind a way to do so—they would be just as petty and trivial as any human's thoughts. Not worth the effort I would expend to reach them.****"So is the new one afraid of us yet?" Emmett asked, still waiting for my response to his question before.****I shrugged. He wasn't interested enough to press for more information. Nor should I be interested.****We got up from the table and walked out of the cafeteria.****Emmett, Royal, and Jasper were pretending to be seniors; they left for their classes. I was playing a younger role than they. I headed off for my junior level biology class, preparing my mind for the tedium. It was doubtful Ms. Banner, a woman of average intelligence, would manage to pull out anything in her lecture that would surprise someone holding two graduate degrees in medicine.****In the classroom, I settled into my chair and let my books—props, again; they held nothing I didn't already know—spill across the table. I was the only student who had a table to himself. The humans weren't smart enough toknowthey feared me, but their survival instincts were enough to keep them away.****The room slowly filled as they trickled in from lunch. I leaned back in my chair and waited for the time to pass. Again, I wished I was able to sleep.****Because I'd been thinking about him, when Angela Weber escorted the new boy through the door, his name intruded on my attention.****Beau seems just as shy as me. I'll bet today is really hard for him. I wish I could say something… but it would probably just sound stupid…****Yes!Mike Newton thought, turning in his seat to watch Angela and Beau enter.****Still, from the place where Beau Swan stood, nothing. The empty space where his thoughts should be irritated and unnerved me.****He came closer, walking down the aisle beside me to get to the teacher's desk. Poor soul; the seat next to me was the only one available. Automatically, I cleared what would be his side of the desk, shoving my books into a pile. I doubted he would feel very comfortable there. He was in for a long semester—in this class, at least. Perhaps, though, sitting beside him, I'd be able to flush out his secrets…not that I'd ever needed close proximity before…not that I would find anything worth listening to…****Beau Swan walked into the flow of the heated hair that blew toward me from the vent.****His scent hit me like a wrecking ball, like a battering ram. There was no image violent enough to encapsulate the force of what happened to me in that moment.****In that instant, I was nothing close to the human I'd once been; no trace of the shreds of humanity I'd manage to cloak myself in remained.****I was a predator. He was my prey. There was nothing else in the whole world but that truth.****There was no room full of witnesses—they were already collateral damage in my head. The mystery of his thoughts was forgotten. His thoughts meant nothing, for he would not go on thinking them much longer.****I was a vampire, and he had the sweetest blood I'd smelled in nearly a century.****I hadn't imagined such a scent could exist. If I'd known it did, I would have gone searching for it long ago. I would have combed the planet for him. I could imagine the taste…****Thirst burned my throat like fire. My mouth was dry and papery. The fresh flow of venom did nothing to dispel the sensation. My stomach twisted with the hunger that was an echo of the thirst. My muscles coiled to spring.****Not a full second had passed. He was still taking the same step that had put him downwind from me.****As his foot touched the ground, his eyes slid toward me, a movement he clearly meant to be stealthy. His glance met mine, and I saw myself reflected in the wide mirror of his silver eyes.****The shock of the face I saw there saved his life for a few thorny moments.****He didn't make it easier. When he processed the expression on my face, blood flooded his cheeks again, turning his skin the most delicious color I'd ever seen. The scent was a thick haze in my brain. I could barely think through it. My thoughts raged, resisting control, incoherent.****He walked more quickly now, as if he understood the need to escape. His haste made him clumsy—he tripped and stumbled forward, almost falling into the girl seated in the front of me. Vulnerable, weak. Even more than usual for a human.****I tried to focus on the face I'd seen in his eyes, a face I recognized with revulsion. The face of the monster in me—the face I'd beaten back with decades of effort and uncompromising discipline. How easily it sprang to the surface now!****The scent swirled around me again, scattering my thoughts and nearly propelling me out of my seat.****No.****My hand gripped under the edge of the table as I tried to hold myself in my chair. The wood was not up to the task. My hand crushed through the strut and came away with a palmful of splintered pulp, leaving the shape of my fingers carved into the remaining wood.****Destroy evidence. That was a fundamental rule. I quickly pulverized the edges of the shape with my fingertips, leaving nothing but a ragged hole and a pile of shavings on the floor, which I scattered with my foot.****Destroy evidence. Collateral damage...****I knew what had to happen now. The boy would have to come sit beside me, and I would have to kill him.****The innocent bystanders in this classroom, eighteen other children and one woman, could not be allowed to leave this room, having seen what they would soon see.****I flinched at the thought of what I must do. Even at my very worst, I had never committed this kind of atrocity. I had never killed innocents, not in over nine decades. And now I planned to slaughter twenty of them at once.****The face of the monster in the mirror mocked me.****Even as part of me shuddered away from the monster, another part was planning it.****If I killed the boy first, I would have only fifteen or twenty seconds with him before the humans in the room would react. Maybe a little bit longer, if at first they did not realize what I was doing. He would not have time to scream or feel pain; I would not kill him cruelly. That much I could give this stranger with his horribly desirable blood.****But then I would have to stop them from escaping. I wouldn't have to worry about the windows, too high up and small to provide an escape for anyone. Just the door—block that and they were trapped.****It would be slower and more difficult, trying to take them all down when they were panicked and scrambling, moving in chaos. Not impossible, but there would be much more noise. Time for lots of screaming. Someone would hear...and I'd be forced to kill even more innocents in this black hour.****And his blood would cool, while I murdered the others****The scent punished me, closing my throat with dry aching...****So the witnesses first then.****I mapped it out in my head. I was in the middle of the room, the furthest row in the back. I would take my right side first. I could snap four or five of their necks per second, I estimated. It would not be noisy. The right side would be the lucky side; they would not see me coming. Moving around the front and back up the left side, it would take me, at most, five seconds to end every life in this room.****Long enough for Beau Swan to see, briefly, what was coming for him. Long enough for him to feel fear. Long enough, maybe, if shock didn't freeze him in place, for him to work up a scream. One soft scream that would not bring anyone running.****I took a deep breath, and the scent was a fire that raced through my veins, burning out from my chest to consume every better impulse that I was capable of.****He was just turning now. In a few seconds, he would sit down inches away from me.****The monster in my head smiled in anticipation.****Someone slammed shut a folder on my left. I didn't look up to see which of the doomed humans it was. But the motion sent a wave of ordinary, unscented air wafting across my face.****For one short second, I was able to think clearly. In that precious second, I saw two faces in my head, side by side.****One was mine, or rather had been: the red-eyed monster that had killed so many people that I'd stop counting their numbers. Rationalized, justified murders. A killer of killers, a killer of other, less powerful monsters. It was a god complex, I acknowledged that—deciding who deserved a death sentence. It was a compromise with myself. I had fed on human blood, but only by the loosest definition. My victims were, in their various dark pastimes, barely more human than I was.****The other face was Carlisle's.****There was no resemblance between the two faces. They were bright day and blackest night.****There was no reason for there to be a resemblance. Carlisle was not my father in the basic biological sense. We shared no common features. The similarity in our coloring was a product of what we were; every vampire had the same ice pale skin. The similarity in the color of our eyes was another matter—a reflection of a mutual choice.****And yet, though there was no basis for a resemblance, I'd imagined that my face had begun to reflect his, to an extent, in the last ninety-odd years that I had embraced his choice and followed in his steps. My features had not changed, but it seemed to me like some of his wisdom had marked my expression, that a little of his compassion could be traced in the shape of my mouth, and hints of his patience were evident on my brow.****All those tiny improvements were lost in the face of the monster. In a few moments, there would be nothing left in me that would reflect the years I'd spent with my creator, my mentor, my father in all the ways that counted. My eyes would glow red as a devil's; all likeness would be lost forever.****In my head, Carlisle's kind eyes did not judge me. I knew that he would forgive me for this horrible act that I would do. Because he loved me. Because he thought I was better than I was. And he would still love me, even as I now proved him wrong.****Beau Swan sat down in the chair next to me, his movements stiff and awkward— with fear?—and the scent of his blood bloomed in an inexorable cloud around me.****I would prove my father wrong about me. The misery of this fact hurt almost as much as the fire in my throat.****I leaned away from him in revulsion—revolted by the monster aching to take him.****Why did he have to come here? Why did he have to exist? Why did he have to ruin the little peace I had in this non-life of mine? Why had this aggravating human ever been born? He would ruin me.****I turned my face away from him, as a sudden fierce, unreasoning hatred washed through me.****Whowasthis creature? Why me, why now? Why did I have to lose everything just because he happened to choose this unlikely town to appear in?****Why had he come here!****I didn't want to be the monster! I didn't want to kill this room full of harmless humans! I didn't want to lose everything I'd gained in a lifetime of sacrifice and denial!****I wouldn't. He couldn't make me.****The scent was the problem, the hideously appealing scent of his blood. If there was only some way to resist...if only another gust of fresh air could clear my head.****Beau Swan ran his fingers through his thick, mahogany hair.****Was he insane? It was as if he were encouraging the monster! Taunting him. There was no friendly breeze to blow the smell away from me now. All would soon be lost.****No, there was no helpful breeze. But I didn'thaveto breathe.****I stopped the flow of air through my lungs; the relief was instantaneous, but incomplete. I still had the memory of the scent in my head, the taste of it on the back of my tongue. I wouldn't be able to resist even that for long. But perhaps I could resist for an hour. One hour. Just enough time to get out of this room full of victims, victims that maybe didn't have tobevictims. If I could resist for one short hour.****It was an uncomfortable feeling, not breathing. My body did not need oxygen, but it went against my instincts. I relied on scent more than my other senses in times of stress. It led the way in the hunt, it was the first warning in case of danger. I did not often came across something as dangerous as I was, but self-preservation was just as strong in my kind as it was in the average human.****Uncomfortable, but manageable. More bearable than smellinghimand not sinking my teeth through that fine, thin, pale skin to the hot, wet, pulsing—****An hour! Just one hour. I must not think of the scent, the taste.****The silent boy leaned forward, resting his head in his hand, turning his face away from me slightly. I couldn't see his face properly, to read the emotions in his clear diamond-gray eyes. Was this why he had turned away from me? To hide those eyes from me? Out of fear? Shyness? To keep his secrets from me?****My former irritation at being stymied by his soundless thoughts was weak and pale in comparison to the need—and the hate—that possessed me now. For I hated this mysterious boy beside me, hated him with all the fervor with which I clung to my former self, my love of my family, my dreams of being something better than what I was... Hating him, hating how he made me feel—it helped a little. Yes, the irritation I'd felt before was weak, but it, too, helped a little. I clung to any emotion that distracted me from imagining what he wouldtastelike...****Hate and irritation. Impatience. Would the hour never pass?****And when the hour ended... Then he would walk out of this room. And I would do what?****I could introduce myself.Hello, my name is Edward Cullen. May I walk you to your next class?****He would say yes. It would be the polite thing to do. Even already fearing me, as I suspected he did, he would follow convention and walk beside me. It should be easy enough to lead him in the wrong direction. A spur of the forest reached out like a finger to touch the back corner of the parking lot. I could tell him I'd forgotten a book in my car...****Would anyone notice that I was the last person he'd been seen with? It was raining, as usual; two dark raincoats heading the wrong direction wouldn't pique too much interest, or give me away.****Except that I was not the only student who was aware of him today—though no one was as blisteringly aware as I was. Mike Newton, in particular, was conscious of every shift in his weight as he fidgeted in his chair—he was uncomfortable so close to me, just as anyone would be, just as I'd expected before his scent had destroyed all charitable concern. Mike Newton would notice if he left the classroom with me.****If I could last an hour, could I last two?****I flinched at the pain of the burning.****He would go home to an empty house. Police Chief Swan worked a full day. I knew his house, as I knew every house in the tiny town. His home was nestled right up against thick woods, with no close neighbors. Even if he had time to scream, which he would not, there would be no one to hear.****That would be the responsible way to deal with this. I'd gone eight decades without human blood. If I held my breath, I could last two hours. And when I had him alone, there would be no chance of anyone else getting hurt.And no reason to rush through the experience, the monster in my head agreed.****It was sophistry to think that by saving the nineteen humans in this room with effort and patience, I would be less a monster when I killed this innocent boy.****Though I hated him, I knew my hatred was unjust. I knew that what I really hated was myself. And I would hate us both so much more when he was dead.****I made it through the hour in this way—imagining the best ways to kill him. I tried to avoid imagining the actualact. That might be too much for me; I might lose this battle and end up killing everyone in sight. So I planned strategy, and nothing more. It carried me through the hour.****Once, toward the very end, he peeked up at me through his fingers. I could feel the unjustified hatred burning out of me as I met his gaze—see the reflection of it in his frightened eyes. Blood painted his cheeks before he could hide in his hands again, and I was nearly undone.****But the bell rang. Saved by the bell—how cliché. We were both saved. He, saved from death. I, saved for just a short time from being the nightmarish creature I feared and loathed.****I couldn't walk as slowly as I should as I darted from the room. If anyone had been looking at me, they might have suspected that there was something not right about the way I moved. No one was paying attention to me. All human thoughts still swirled around the boy who was condemned to die in little more than an hour's time.****I hid in my car.****I didn't like to think of myself having to hide. How cowardly that sounded. But it was unquestionably the case now.****I didn't have enough discipline left to be around humans now. Focusing so much of my efforts on not killingoneof them left me no resources to resist the others. What a waste that would be. If I were to give in to the monster, I might as well make it worth the defeat.****I played a CD of music that usually calmed me, but it did little for me now. No, what helped most now was the cool, wet, clean air that drifted with the light rain through my open windows. Though I could remember the scent of Beau Swan's blood with perfect clarity, inhaling the clean air was like washing out the inside of my body from its infection.****I was sane again. I could think again. And I could fight again. I could fight against what I didn't want to be.****I didn't have to go to his home. I didn't have to kill him. Obviously, I was a rational, thinking creature, and I had a choice. There was always a choice.****It hadn't felt that way in the classroom...but I was away from him now. Perhaps, if I avoided him very, very carefully, there was no need for my life to change. I had things ordered the way I liked them now. Why should I let some aggravating and delicious nobody ruin that?****I didn'thaveto disappoint my father. I didn't have to cause my mother stress, worry...pain. Yes, it would hurt my adopted mother, too. And Esme was so gentle, so tender and soft. Causing someone like Esme pain was truly inexcusable.****How ironic that I'd wanted to protect this human boy from the paltry, toothless threat of his classmates' thoughts. I was the last person who would ever stand as a protector for Beauregard Swan. He would never need protection from anything more than he needed it from me.****Where was Alice, I suddenly wondered? Hadn't she seen me killing the Swan boy in a multitude of ways? Why hadn't she come to help—to stop me or help me clean up the evidence, whichever? Was she so absorbed with watching for trouble with Jasper that she'd missed this much more horrific possibility? Was I stronger than I thought? Would I really not have done anything to the boy?****No. I knew that wasn't true. Alice must be concentrating on Jasper very hard.****I searched in the direction I knew she would be, in the small building used for English classes. It did not take me long to locate her familiar 'voice.' And I was right. Her every thought was turned to Jasper, watching his small choices with minute scrutiny.****I wished I could ask her advice, but at the same time, I was glad she didn't know what I was capable of. That she was unaware of the massacre I had considered in the last hour.****I felt a new burn through my body—the burn of shame. I didn't want any of them to know.****If I could avoid Beau Swan, if I could manage not to kill him—even as I thought that, the monster writhed and gnashed his teeth in frustration—then no one would have to know. If I could keep away from his scent...****There was no reason why I shouldn't try, at least. Make a good choice. Try to be what Carlisle thought I was.****The last hour of school was almost over. I decided to put my new plan into action at once. Better than sitting here in the parking lot where he might pass me and ruin my attempt. Again, I felt the unjust hatred for the boy. I hated that he had this unconscious power over me. That he could make me be something I reviled.****I walked swiftly—a little too swiftly, but there were no witnesses—across the tiny campus to the office. There was no reason for Beau Swan to cross paths with me. He would be avoided like the plague he was.****The office was empty except for the secretary, the one I wanted to see.****She didn't notice my silent entrance.****"Mrs. Cope?"****The woman with the unnaturally red hair looked up and her eyes widened. It always caught them off guard, the little markers they didn't understand, no matter how many times they'd seen one of us before.****"Oh," she gasped, a little flustered. She smoothed her shirt.Silly,she thought to herself.He's almost young enough to be my son. Too young to think of that way...****"Hello, Edward. What can I do for you?" Her eyelashes fluttered behind her thick glasses.****Uncomfortable. But I knew how to be charming when I wanted to be. It was easy, since I was able to know instantly how any tone or gesture was taken.****I leaned forward, meeting her gaze as if I were staring deeply into her depthless, small brown eyes. Her thoughts were already in a flutter. This should be simple.****"I was wondering if you could help me with my schedule," I said in the soft voice I reserved for not scaring humans.****I heard the tempo of her heart increase.****"Of course, Edward. How can I help?"Too young, too young,she chanted to herself. Wrong, of course. I was older than her grandfather. But according to my driver's license, she was right.****"I was wondering if I could move from my biology class to a senior level science? Physics, perhaps?"****"It there a problem with Mrs. Banner, Edward?"****"Not at all, it's just that I've already studied this material..."****"In that accelerated school you all went to in Alaska, right." Her thin lips pursed as she considered this.They should all be in college. I've heard the teachers complain. Perfect four point ohs, never a hesitation with a response, never a wrong answer on a test—like they've found some way to cheat in every subject. Mr. Varner would rather believe that anyone was cheating than think a student was smarter than him... I'll bet their mother tutors them..."Actually, Edward, physics is pretty much full right now. Mrs. Banner hates to have more than twenty-five students in a class—"****"I wouldn't be any trouble."****Of course not. Not a perfect Cullen."I know that, Edward. But there just aren't enough seats as it is..."****"Could I drop the class, then? I could use the period for independent study."****"Drop biology?" He mouth fell open.That's crazy. How hard is it to sit through a subject you already know? Theremustbe a problem with Mrs. Banner. I wonder if I should talk to Betty about it?"You won't have enough credits to graduate."****"I'll catch up next year."****"Maybe you should talk to your parents about that."****The door opened behind me, but who ever it was did not think of me, so I ignored the arrival and concentrated on Mrs. Cope. I leaned slightly closer, and held my eyes a little wider. This would work better if they were gold instead of black. The blackness frightened people, as it should.****"Please, Mrs. Cope?" I made my voice as smooth and compelling as it could be— and it could be considerably compelling. "Isn't there some other section I could switch to? I'm sure there has to be an open slot somewhere? Sixth hour biology can't be the only option..."****I smiled at her, careful not to flash my teeth so widely that it would scare her, letting the expression soften my face.****Her heart drummed faster.Too young,she reminded herself frantically. "Well, maybe I could talk to Betty—I mean Mrs. Banner. I could see if—"****A second was all it took to change everything: the atmosphere in the room, my mission here, the reason I leaned toward the red-haired woman... What had been for one purpose before was now for another.****A second was all it took for Samantha Wells to open the door and place a signed tardy slip in the basket by the door, and hurry out again, in a rush to be away from school. A second was all it took for the sudden gust of wind through the open door to crash into me. A second was all it took for me to realize why that first person through the door had not interrupted me with his thoughts.****I turned, though I did not need to make sure. I turned slowly, fighting to control the muscles that rebelled against me.****Beau Swan stood with his back pressed to the wall beside the door, a piece of paper clutched in his hands. His eyes were even wider than usual as he took in my ferocious, inhuman glare.****The smell of his blood saturated every particle of air in the tiny, hot room. My throat burst into flames.****The monster glared back at me from the mirror of his eyes again, a mask of evil.****My hand hesitated in the air above the counter. I would not have to look back in order to reach across it and slam Mrs. Cope's head into her desk with enough force to kill her. Two lives, rather than twenty. A trade.****The monster waited anxiously, hungrily, for me to do it.****But there was always a choice—therehadto be.****I cut off the motion of my lungs, and fixed Carlisle's face in front of my eyes. I turned back to face Mrs. Cope, and heard her internal surprise at the change in my expression. She shrank away from me, but her fear did not form into coherent words.****Using all the control I'd mastered in my decades of self-denial, I made my voice even and smooth. There was just enough air left in my lungs to speak once more, rushing through the words.****"Never mind, then. I can see that it's impossible. Thank you so much for your help."****I spun and launched myself from the room, trying not to feel the warm-blooded heat of the boy's body as I passed within inches of it.****I didn't stop until I was in my car, moving too fast the entire way there. Most of the humans had cleared out already, so there weren't a lot of witnesses. I heard a sophomore, D.J. Garrett, notice, and then disregard...****Where did Cullen come from—it was like he just came out of thin air... There I go, with the imagination again. Mom always says...****When I slid into my Volvo, the others were already there. I tried to control my breathing, but I was gasping at the fresh air like I'd been suffocated.****"Edward?" Alice asked, alarm in her voice.****I just shook my head at her.****"What the hell happened to you?" Emmett demanded, distracted, for the moment, from the fact that Jasper was not in the mood for his rematch.****Instead of answering, I threw the car into reverse. I had to get out of this lot before Beau Swan could follow me here, too. My own person demon, haunting me... I swung the car around and accelerated. I hit forty before I was on the road. On the road, I hit seventy before I made the corner.****Without looking, I knew that Emmett, Royal and Jasper had all turned to stare at Alice. She shrugged. She couldn't see what had passed, only what was coming.****She looked ahead for me now. We both processed what she saw in her head, and we were both surprised.****"You're leaving?" she whispered.****The others stared at me now.****"Am I?" I hissed through my teeth.****She saw it then, as my resolve wavered and another choice spun my future in a darker direction. "Oh."****Beau Swan, dead. My eyes, glowing crimson with fresh blood. The search that would follow. The careful time we would wait before it was safe for us to pull out and start again...****"Oh," she said again. The picture grew more specific. I saw the inside of Chief Swan's house for the first time, saw Beau in a small kitchen with yellow cupboards, his back to me as I stalked him from the shadows...let the scent pull me toward him...****"Stop!" I groaned, not able to bear more.****"Sorry," she whispered, her eyes wide.****The monster rejoiced.****And the vision in her head shifted again. An empty highway at night, the trees beside it coated in snow, flashing by at almost two hundred miles per hour.****"I'll miss you," she said. "No matter how short a time you're gone."****Emmett and Royal exchanged an apprehensive glance.****We were almost to the turn off onto the long drive that led to our home.****"Drop us here," Alice instructed. "You should tell Carlisle yourself."****I nodded, and the car squealed to a sudden stop.****Emmett, Royal and Jasper got out in silence; they would make Alice explain when I was gone. Alice touched my shoulder.****"You will do the right thing," she murmured. Not a vision this time—an order. "He's Charlie Swan's only family. It would kill him, too."****"Yes," I said, agreeing only with the last part.****She slid out to join the others, her eyebrows pulling together in anxiety. They melted into woods, out of sight before I could turn the car around.****I accelerated back toward town, and I knew the visions in Alice's head would be flashing from dark to bright like a strobe light. As I sped back to Forks doing ninety, I wasn't sure where I was going. To say goodbye to my father? Or to embrace the monster inside me?****The road flew away beneath my tires.**


End file.
